By the end of 2012, the grain planting area of Qingdao was 540,800 hectares reduced by 0.9% year on year; the forest coverage is 38.6% increased by 0.8%; the area of coastal beach is about 375 km2 and the sea area within 30m isobath is about 9,165 km2.
There’re numerous bays in the sea area of Qingdao with winding coastline, broad beaches and fertile water quality. It is a place for living and reproduction of various aquatic lives and has high economic value and potential of development and use. The sea area at the mouths of Jiaozhou Bay, Laoshan Bay and Dingzi Bay has high content of nutritive salt with sufficient supplementary source. The quantity of heterotrophic bacterium here is several times to thousands of times higher than that in continental shelf zones and oceanic zones and the content of organics in water is higher here. Especially the section with sand and silt bottom substrate around Jiaozhou Bay is an excellent sea area to develop the aquaculture of shellfish and algae. The sea area has also profound resources of plankton, benthos, economic invertebrates and intertidal desmids.
The plants in Qingdao are diversified and lush. It’s the region with the most categories of plants and the most constructive species of vegetation among the same regions at the same latitude. There’re 152 families, 654 genus and 1237 species and variants of plant resources (excluding the species cultivated in greenhouse and types of flower culture). There’re 66 families, 136 genus and 332 species of primary woody plant fauna which represent 93% of total families, 84% of total genus and 80.2% of total species respectively of woody plant fauna of Shandong Province.
Qingdao belongs to sub-region of Huang-Huai Plain of North China region of palearctic realm in terms of the regionalization of geographical distribution of vertebrates. Influenced by the marine monsoon of warm temperate zone, the climate here is warm and humid, which is favorable for growth of plants and for habitation and reproduction of animals, but there’re few big wild beasts. The wild vertebrates of Qingdao in the modern period are mostly small animals with no big beasts of prey or big herbivores. The mammals include sciuridae, cricetidae, muridae, leporidae, canidae, mustelidae, vespertilionidae, erinaceidae, etc. The amphibians include ranidae, bufonidae, discoglossidae, microhylidae, etc. The reptiles include lacertide, colubridae, viperidae, tortoises, trionyxes, etc. There’re 66 species of national first-grade and second-grade protected rare animals of which 52 species are first-grade protected animals. There’re special animals such as Xiantai fish produced in Baisha River. There’re many species of wild invertebrates within the region, approximately divided into forest insects and agricultural insects. Domesticated animals include livestock such as cattle, horse, goat, pig and dog and poultry such as chicken, duck and goose.
Qingdao area has rich bird resources. During more than 10 years of bird banding protection in Qingdao, more than 2000 specimens have been collected including 19 orders, 58 families, 159 genus and 355 species representing 29.6% of the 1200 bird species of the country and 87.4% of the 406 bird species of Shandong Province. There’re 11 species of national first-grade protected rare birds and 55 species of national second-grade protected birds. The birds in Qingdao are mainly divided into 6 categories: swimming birds, wading birds, terrestrial birds, raptors, climbing birds and songbirds.
The mineral resources in Qingdao are mostly nonmetal mines. By the end of 2007, 66 varieties of mines (including sub-mines) were discovered, representing 44% of the total varieties of Shandong Province. Among them, 50 varieties were proven reserves (resource quantity) representing 64.1% of the total reserve of Shandong Province and the reserves of the other 16 mines were not yet proven. There’re also 730 different mineral producing areas explored or proven through investigation in which 39 are large and middle-sized deposits, 129 small-sized deposits and 562 mineral occurrences. The advantageous mineral resources include graphite, decorative granite, decorative marble, mineral water, diopside, gold, talc and zeolite. The potential advantageous mineral resources include barite, dolomite, bentonite, potash feldspar, quartzite, perlite, fluorite and terrestrial heat. The graphite, gold and diopside are mainly distributed in Pingdu and Laixi; the decorative granite is mainly distributed in Laoshan district, Pingdu and Huangdao district; the decorative marble is mainly distributed in Pingdu; the mineral water is distributed in all districts of Qingdao, but mainly centralized in Chengyang district, Laoshan district, three downtown districts and Jimo; the talc is mainly distributed in Pingdu; the zeolite, perlite and bentonite are mainly distributed in Laixi, Jiaozhou, Jimo and Chengyang district; the barite and fluorite are mainly distributed in Jiaozhou, Jimo, Pingdu and Huangdao district; the terrestrial heat is mainly distributed in Jimo. The reserves of graphite and stone mines of Qingdao are No.1 in Shandong Province, the reserves of talc and diopside are No.2 and the reserves of zeolite and mineral water are also in leading positions. Except aranium, thorium, terrestrial heat, natural brine, sand for construction and clay for bricks, the potential total value of the reserves of mineral resources is up to RMB 27 billion Yuan.
Qingdao has rich resource of wind energy. According to measurement, the effective wind energy density is 240.3 W/m2 and the average annual duration of effective wind energy is 6,485 hours. The light energy is also good. The annual total solar radiation is 120 kilocalories / cm2 and the average annual sunshine duration is 2,550.7 hours at a sunshine percentage of 58%.
